The Games at Nennig Written November 8, 2024 Fans of a certain type of competition have been anticipating the next Ultimate Fighting Championship, or UFC.  To describe the first one in 1993, television critic Howard Rosenberg defined it as “mixed martial arts.” But MMA was not really new.  Mixing the martial arts has a long history. When Romans settled in the Moselle River valley over 2,000 years ago, they brought many modern marvels with them, including underfloor heating, winemaking, pipe organs, aqueducts, and road networks. A denarius issued by the emperor Commodus (AD 180-192) fell to the ground in Nennig, Germany, across the river from Luxembourg.  Soon afterwards, a palatial villa was erected on that ground.  Archaeologists deduce that it was built around the beginning of the third century. One of its rooms was a 35-by-50 foot entrance atrium featuring a mosaic floor including a marble basin and more than three million tesserae.  This outstanding work of art, depicting a day of games, was discovered during renovations in 1960.  These tiles were arranged in more than just geometric patterns; they also included action pictures.

Game day began with music.  The long-haired guy at the keyboard is playing a “water organ,” in which a water-filled reservoir exerts hydraulic pressure on an air chamber below to force air up through the pipes.  Beside him is a horn player, apparently wondering whether his brass tube could be folded back and forth to form a more compact instrument.

When the contests began, a bear attacked three men.  Each had a whip in his right hand while his left arm was protected by armor which could be shoved between the bear's jaws.   Later came individual gladiatorial combats, usually matches between two men demonstrating mixed marital arts — meaning different armor and fighting styles. The largest scene, shown below, depicts combat between a retiarius wielding a trident and a dagger and a secutor armed with a shield and a short sword.  An arbiter or referee signals the fight to begin.

In modern times, a numbered pay-per-view Ultimate Fighting Championship is televised almost every month.  I understand that handheld weapons and shields are no longer allowed.